Development Challenges of India After Twenty Five Years of Economic Reforms : Inequality, Labour, Employment and Migration

This book revisits some of the persisting challenges of development of India, which remain unresolved even after twenty-five years of economic reforms and almost fifteen years of high growth rate. These include defining purpose of development, inequality, labour, work, unemployment, agrarian distress and migration. The book questions the overemphasis on growth to the extent of neglecting basic issues of development. With a number of contributions re-imagining development and its political economy, the book discusses above mentioned issues in light of new data and more recent conceptions of the issues. The contributors of this volume are eminent researchers in their respective field. Presenting primary as well as secondary data, the book considers the latest advances and research and also addresses new challenges like the global reorganization of production and the consequences for labour and the world of work, along with skills question. World of work has received detailed investigation in this book. This is a timely addition in existing literature especially in context of pandemic and lockdown. Informality and un/employment question is addressed in this context. Relationship among poverty, inequality and growth is examined in light of newer understanding. Agrarian distress is looked in a broader context. A number of papers are examining migration question by expanding coverage of migration and including labour mobility as apart of migration debate. The present crisis of migrant labour and absence of social security for these workers is also discussed.

This book is primarily intended for those interested in recent advances on some of the basic aspects of development, like poverty, inequality, informality, word of work, migration and labour mobility. It is also useful for researchers, policy makers, journalists and civil society organizations working on these issues.

Nripendra Kishore Mishra is a Professor in the Department of Economics at Banaras Hindu University (BHU) Varanasi. He has 22 years of teaching and research experience, specializing in development economics, and was a Visiting Researcher at the Rural Development Institute, Chinese Academy of Social Sciences (CASS), Beijing. He started his career at DAV College, Gorakhpur and moved on to become a Reader and Professor at BHU, Varanasi. Prof. Mishra has published more than 15 research papers in respected journals and has completed 9 research projects funded by national and international agencies. His work with NCEUS and the Ministry of Minority Affairs has had a significant impact on government policymaking. Recently, Prof. Mishra has successfully created a panel of poor households with a gap of twenty years in backward regions of Uttar Pradesh and Bihar. Prof. Mishra’s primary area of research of is poverty, employment, labour, informal economy, women’s empowerment and rural non-farm sector, particularly in Uttar Pradesh. Prof Mishra is associated with many professional organization and journals in various capacities.